Dog digs up human skull, machetes, 'creepy' doll head in backyard

Authorities said experts and police are examining a human skull, machetes, animal remains and a "creepy-looking" doll head dug up by a dog last week in the backyard of a rented home in Northern California.

It took three weeks of relentless digging before Skye, a 4-year-old husky, unearthed the remains, prompting roommates at the Yuba City home to call police.

“She never digs in the grass or anything, but that one spot. She just wouldn’t leave it alone,” renter Aaron Kind told KCRA-TV.

Kind said that at first, the dog unearthed a “creepy-looking” doll head, and then an entire cache of machetes and remains in a clay pot.

“There were machetes, horns with shells wrapped around it, a whole bunch of animal skulls -- I think coyote skulls, a goat skull and bunch of bird skulls,” roommate Nathan Olberman told Fox 40. “And then when the flower pot broke, we saw an actual mandible of a human skull.”

Experts called in from Cal State Chico said the items were possibly used as part of an Afro-Caribbean religious tradition, but officials are still trying to determine the origin and age of the human remains, and how long they've been underground.

Yuba City police said the investigation is continuing and that foul play had not been ruled out in the case.